How to Write an Abstract in the Humanities
Writing an abstract in the humanities can be difficult given that a lot of the standard advice for writing abstracts for research papers does not apply to papers in the humanities.
This is because, unlike research papers that report experimental results, humanities papers often instead offer an interpretation of a text or argument of some kind.
So, then what information should you include?
This question is easier to answer when you remember the main purpose of a humanities abstract:
When writing an abstract in the humanities, your main goal is to help readers quickly understand what the paper argues and whether it is worth their time to read the entire article.
But then the question is, “How do you accomplish that goal in just a few hundred words?”
You do it by making sure your abstract does five key things:
Introduce the topic.
State the research problem.
Present the paper’s central argument.
Identify the materials and approach.
Explain the significance of the argument.
1. Introduce the Topic
The first step in writing a humanities abstract is to clarify your paper’s topic and provide some (but not too much) background information on it.
The purpose of these opening sentences is to signal to the reader what the paper is about so they can tell quickly whether it’s of interest to them.
With that in mind, it’s a good idea to keep the opening sentences informative yet concise since spending too much time introducing the topic leaves you with less room to explain your central argument.
The following passage, for example, contains far too much detail:
Baseball has played an important role in American culture since the nineteenth century, attracting millions of fans and becoming a prominent feature of newspapers, radio broadcasts, and television programming. In New York City, the sport has a particularly rich history, with teams such as the Yankees, Giants, and Dodgers attracting devoted followings over the decades. This paper examines the significant changes professional baseball underwent concerning its racial composition, particularly following Jackie Robinson's integration of Major League Baseball in 1947 until the end of the twentieth century, looking specifically at how newspaper reports portrayed Black and White baseball players during this period.
This passage could be greatly improved by retaining only the most essential background info, plus a sentence that answers the question, “What is this paper about?”
Baseball has played an important role in American culture since the nineteenth century, attracting millions of fans and becoming a prominent feature of newspapers, radio broadcasts, and television programming. This paper examines changing attitudes toward race in American sports by comparing New York City newspapers’ portrayals of Black and White baseball players following the integration of Black players into Major League Baseball in 1947 until 1999.
2. Explain Your Motivation
After introducing the general topic, authors usually narrow things down by presenting the specific question, problem, or debate that motivated the paper.
The motivation could be a gap in the existing literature, a component of text that has been overlooked, or a scholarly disagreement about the interpretation of an event.
The important thing is to show readers why your paper is worth reading. Simply identifying a topic doesn’t explain what your paper sets out to address.
A common mistake in the abstracts written by students I’ve worked with is that the motivation isn’t stated specifically enough. They often say something like:
This paper explores how racial attitudes influenced the portrayal of baseball players in American newspapers during the second half of the twentieth century.
The problem with this sentence is that it doesn’t explain what question the paper answers or what problem it aims to solve. It also doesn’t tell readers why your paper is worth reading among other papers previously written on the portrayal of Black and White baseball players in sports media.
Better versions of a sentence explaining the paper’s motivation include:
Although some scholars argue that newspaper coverage became less racially biased following baseball's integration, others contend that racial stereotypes persisted in sports journalism well into the late twentieth century.
Previous studies have generally interpreted the growing visibility of Black baseball players in newspaper coverage as evidence of increasing racial equality, overlooking the possibility that greater visibility did not necessarily lead to more equitable portrayals.
To date, no study has specifically analyzed whether New York City newspapers used different language in describing the athletic abilities of Black and White players, even when reporting on comparable performances.
3. State the Paper's Central Argument
Stating the paper's central argument is the most important part of a humanities abstract. If your abstract doesn’t clearly present your paper’s primary claim, it’s not doing its job.
Some common ways to present an argument include:
Present a unique perspective on a historical subject.
For example:
This paper argues that New York City newspapers portrayed Black baseball players as symbols of racial progress while continuing to describe their individual achievements in ways that reinforced racial stereotypes.
Challenge a common interpretation.
For example:
Contrary to the view that newspaper coverage became more racially equitable following baseball's integration, this paper argues that racial bias persisted in sports journalism, becoming less explicit but remaining evident in how Black and white players were described.
Make an overlooked point about a scholarly debate.
For example:
This paper argues that the debate over whether sports journalism became less racially biased after integration has overlooked an important distinction between the amount of coverage Black players received and, especially, the language used to describe them.
For longer abstracts, authors sometimes also briefly outline their main lines of reasoning or provide the main points of evidence that support the argument.
For example:
This paper demonstrates this disparity by showing that, compared to White players, Black players were more frequently praised for their physical strength and speed than for strategic ability. Moreover, Black players’ achievements were more often attributed to natural talent, while White players were more often credited for their intelligence and leadership.
4. Identify Your Materials and Approach (Optional)
Depending on how you conducted your research, you may need to tell readers what materials you used (e.g., literary works, historical records, archival documents) and explain the approach you followed in interpreting them.
If your paper uses a particular theoretical framework or interpretive approach, you can also touch on this. For example, you might mention that you followed a Marxist approach or conducted a discourse analysis.
For example, an author might write:
Using content analysis and critical discourse analysis, this paper examines differences in how New York City newspapers described the athletic abilities, intelligence, and temperament of Black and white baseball players.
Sometimes, authors combine this step with the previous one to form a single sentence:
Content analysis and critical discourse analysis of newspaper articles published between 1947 and 1999 were used to support this paper’s central argument that the debate over whether sports journalism became less racially biased after integration has overlooked an important distinction between the amount of coverage Black players received and, especially, the language used to describe them.
5. Explain the Significance of the Argument
The standard way to end a humanities abstract is to explain what your paper contributes to the literature or how it changes the current understanding of the topic.
For example, an author might close their abstract by clarifying how their argument challenges a common belief or how it provides a new insight into an ongoing debate.
When highlighting your paper’s contribution to the literature, don’t rely on vague phrases that don’t actually explain what the contribution is.
For example, you don’t want to write something like:
This paper provides new insights into the portrayal of Black and White baseball players in sports media in the second half of the twentieth century.
It’s not enough to simply tell readers that your paper makes a contribution. You need to show them what the specific contribution is:
By distinguishing between the amount of coverage Black players received and the language used to describe them, this paper demonstrates that increased visibility in sports media did not necessarily translate into more equitable portrayals.
Humanities Abstract Example
Here's an example of a 246-word abstract published in the Journal of the American Musicological Society to show you how the steps outlined in this article are applied in practice.
Beneath the example, I explain how each sentence helps readers determine whether the full paper is worth reading.
(1) Frank Zappa reveled in the act of rending asunder all manner of musical genres. (2) He ruthlessly but lovingly combined rock music, jazz, and art music, among other styles, into his own idiosyncratic fusion that simultaneously embraced and rejected the norms associated with those musics. (3) Among his most ambitious projects and most difficult to classify is 200 Motels, oratorio, rock concert, film, and amalgam of music and theater. (4) Here, I consider the role of music in the film, not as film music per se, because it in no way functions like a conventional film soundtrack. (5) Instead, Zappa explores a number of strategies to exploit music in the film of which I shall investigate two: music as an integral part of the narrative and music used to bind together longer stretches of the film. (6) In the first case, Zappa uses songs, their lyrics, and especially the songs’ stylistic signifiers to address specific narrative issues including the context that motivates the film’s narrative arc, namely touring, life on the road, glimpses of life in Centerville, the fictional setting of the film, and the concerts themselves. (7) Second, larger forms, such as a ternary variation and a rondo variation, suture together longer passages of the film. (8) The film concludes with a grand finale, the song “Strictly Genteel,” which demonstrates that the film as a whole can be understood as a long-range metaphor of rock culture, the central component of which is the music, the rock music that Zappa so lovingly presents.
Sentences 1 and 2 introduce the subject (Frank Zappa) very broadly and provide some background on his approach to music without going into too much detail while still giving readers the context they need to understand the paper’s subject.
Sentence 3 then narrows the focus from Zappa’s work in general to 200 Motels. The description of the project’s unusual nature suggests that it warrants a close examination.
Sentences 4 and 5 narrow things down even more, clarifying that the paper focuses on two specific strategies that Zappa uses to exploit music in 200 Motels. In doing so, these sentences imply the author’s motivation for writing this paper—namely, that the presumption that the “soundtrack” of 200 Motels functions as a film soundtrack is a false presumption.
These sentences also imply the author’s main argument, though it isn’t spelled out. The argument is that, unlike in typical films, in 200 Motels, Frank Zappa uses music as an integral part of the narrative and to bind together longer stretches of the film.
Sentences 6 and 7 then present the author’s main lines of reasoning to support this argument.
Sentence 8 explains the broader significance of the analysis—that 200 Motels should not be approached as a standard film but rather as an extended metaphor for rock culture.
Summary
The main purpose of a humanities abstract is to help readers quickly decide if they should read your full paper.
Therefore, your abstract should accomplish the following:
Introduce your paper’s topic.
State the research problem you addressed.
Present your paper’s central argument.
Identify the materials you used and your research approach.
Explain the significance of your argument.
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